The Return: A Novel Read Online Free Page A

“Well, I’ll let you go now. You’ll let Peter know, yes?”
    “You could call him yourself,” she said.
    “I could. But if he doesn’t take my call…”
    He heard her sigh. “Okay. Have a great trip and keep in touch.”
    He said he would, said he’d loved her, said goodbye, pushed the button to end the call. For an instant he felt he’d switched himself off, as if he’d already died. Not staying in touch was the whole point.
    *   *   *
    As he often did when he was annoyed with himself and the world, Marder decided to go shooting. He packed his two pistols and their magazines and ammunition into their customized aluminum case and took a cab to the Westside Shooting Range on 20th Street. On the ride, he thought of a way to save himself a trip, so he called his accountant and told him to have the money he’d asked for ready at his office in an hour. The accountant asked him if he seriously intended to carry a hundred fifty thousand dollars in cash through the streets of Manhattan. Marder told him not to worry about it.
    Marder had been coming to Westside for years and paid in advance by the month so he was always assured a lane. The firing line was crowded with nervously chattering newbies taking a firearms class, and he was glad he was wearing ear protectors.
    He clipped a small paste-on circle target to the line and sent it a-flapping to the seven-yard marker, then loaded the first of the two pistols he was going to fire. This was a .45-caliber Kimber 1911, a high-tech, super-accurate version of the sidearm that American soldiers had carried throughout most of the twentieth century. He loaded it, took a stance, and fired a shot. A hole appeared in the center of the bull’s-eye, rimmed by the fluorescent-yellow paint built into the target’s paper. He fired again. No change was apparent, and he fired five more times, then placed the pistol on the little shelf and drew the target back. On examination, the hole had become slightly larger than the original puncture, which meant he had shot six bullets through the hole made by his first one. It was a feat he’d accomplished often. He loaded another magazine and shot at ten yards and again at twenty, each time blowing the center out of the target.
    He now took from his case the elder brother of the Kimber, an actual military .45 his dad had brought back from the Pacific. It was still formally the property of the United States Army, but he thought they probably weren’t looking for it too hard. He shot three magazines with this, not as accurately as before but still well enough: at seven yards, all the holes touched.
    Marder then did something he hadn’t done before. He slipped a fresh magazine into the old .45 and he stuck the pistol into his waistband, where it hung heavily, concealed by the raincoat he wore. Feeling a little foolish at this precaution, and in violation of the laws of New York, he cased the other pistol and left the range, for the last time, he supposed. He walked to Sixth Avenue, and in one of those miscellaneous-goods stores he purchased an aluminum suitcase and then took a cab to his accountant’s office uptown. He gave the driver a fifty and told him to keep the meter going, then went in and and collected his cash. Packed in his new suitcase, it felt heavier than he’d expected.
    From the cab he called the last person he needed to contact before leaving. Patrick Francis Skelly was not at home. An old-style answering machine picked up, and Skelly’s voice said, “Skelly isn’t here, obviously. Leave a message.” Marder called back several times on the ride downtown but reached only the machine. From home he called several more times, then gave up for the moment. He hadn’t eaten all day, had fasted before the doctor’s visit and found that, though dying in a way, he still liked eating. He liked cooking too. He grilled a steak and made a Caesar salad with a soft-boiled egg and lots of anchovies and ate it while watching the news,